The state of things...

• I'm too annoyed at the Health Care legislation issue to comment extensively on it. The entire thing just sounds like a huge clusterfuck (and that's a technical term there) of the first order. I'm displeased about there being no public option and I suspect that it won't change the insurance company abuses. But, of course, only time will tell how it will pan out. I do not for one second blame it on the President though, but rather entirely on the Congress.



• Except for some ends that still need to be woven in and blocking, I've finished the OpArt baby blanket I've made for my friend Andrea, who is expecting a little one in about a month. She is the first of my friends that I went to high school with to have a child. The blanket is lovely. I've also made a Jayne hat and another hat and a pair of booties. There will probably be more things to follow, although she doesn't like the cutesy baby things so that cuts out a lot of the options at the newborn stage of things.



• I'm making Pumpkin-Cranberry bread pudding. I wish I had a recipe, but I don't. It's something from Dinner Done, a dessert that I bought out of their Grab-and-Go freezer. I hope it will be good and can't imagine that it won't be.



• I made 48 half-pints of strawberry jam this past weekend. It took almost all day both Saturday and Sunday. It's delicious!



• The garden is looking awesome! I need to take pictures and put them up here. The peppers are a little less than I'd like them to be right now, but hopefully they fertilizer I put on them today will perk and green them up. We've had good rain for the past few weeks.



• Passover is coming up and we've got most of the kosher for Passover food that we'll need. Last year, we were in VA over Passover and had to take all the food up there with us because there's no where to buy it up in the Ville. But this year, we will be here. I was glad to find rotini and shell pasta to buy this year, as well as organic and whole grain matzohs. I'm really glad that those are options now! Oh, another interesting thing I found the other day - Target has Passover dishes! I was surprised! Plates and platters and special "matzoh plates" with the word מצה (matzoh) in the center in silver. Unusual and unexpected at a place such as Target. I thought about buying it, but I figured I'd wait a week and if they still have any, they'll be on clearance for a fraction of the price.

Weekend projects...

My friend Joe and I planted fruit trees on Saturday. My mom has been wanting a yard full of fruit trees for the better part of 30 years and something has always happened, either to them once they've been planted or to prevent trees from being planted at all. But now we have them. An Anna apple tree, a Dorsett Golden apple tree, a papaya, a mango, a Florida Hass avocado, a Meyer lemon tree, a Persian lime, a Key lime, a Valencia orange, a Hamlin orange and a Brown Turkey fig. It was quite a day, filled with digging and hauling and peat moss. We already had an Anna apple, a Brown Turkey fig, a pink grapefruit and a lemon tree. The lemon tree and the pink grapefruit both used to be orange trees. They died back in freezes back in the 80s, their graphs died or something, and when they grew again, they started producing other kinds of citrus fruit. I think this is the neatest thing about citrus trees. Both are much more than 30 years old now because they were here before the house was built in '79 and the land was still an orange grove.

I took the subject area exam on Saturday as well. I'm confident that I passed it and will be very surprised if I didn't.

Today, I went to the yarn shop but forgot to take along the notes about projects that I want to get started on soon, so I didn't get any needles or yarn for planned projects. I did get some yarn though. I can't go there without picking up something. I got some Qina in Wisteria and some Angora yarn in peacock green.

And then this evening, I made banana bread. I hope that it will be delicious and strongly suspect it will. I should post the recipe. My mom has been using it for about 30 years.

I've been working constantly this month. There have only been two weekdays the entire month of October when I haven't worked. So very busy. It's good because more work means more money, but it's still been quite a lot of work and I'll be glad to have some time off. This week, I know I'm working Monday and Tuesday, but I'm not sure about the rest of the week yet.

Edited to include recipe:

My Mom's Banana Bread

1/2 cup butter
1 cup sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
2 eggs
3/4 cup mashed very ripe bananas
1 1/4 cups all purpose flour
3/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt

Cream the sugar and butter together in a mixing bowl. Add vanilla and eggs. Beat together as if you were making scrambled eggs. This will help the bread be lighter. Add bananas. Stir until well mixed. Add all dry ingredients, a little at a time, stirring together in between. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a loaf pan and pour mixture into it. Bake for 50 - 60 minutes. The very center of the bread will probably still be a little moist and the corners will look like they are too dry when it's done.

Yay! Yarn! And Pie!

I made pie tonight... Pumpkin pie... Two of them. With this recipe. I didn't have any evaporated milk on hand, so I made some myself on the stove... Took about an hour and a half to slowly boil 3 cups of milk down to 1 1/2 cups... Next time, I'll just run out to the 24-hour Super Walmart. Still. YUM!







I spilled the filling of one of them just a bit, so that's what the darker places are on the crust edges.

I just tried the first piece... It's very custard-like and the pumpkin flavor isn't very strong (although it still tastes good), and I added an extra 1/2 cup of pumpkin. I may need to strain the pumpkin better, or it could be because my pie crusts weren't large enough for the entire filling. I made the same amount as the recipe calls for, but the pie crusts weren't deep enough for it all. Deep dish pie crusts are obviously a must.

And I finally uploaded pictures of the yarn I made for Jensen and Jared's socks.

Jensen's color... worsted weight, superwash merino:




The main color for both pairs of socks... worsted weight, superwash merino-alpaca:




Jared's color... worsted weight, superwash bfl:




I also just uploaded the pictures I took the weekend before last when I went out to a park in Pasco County with my mom and her friends from dog training class. They have a doberman. A very well trained doberman. Far better than our Maxie.

Maxie: